


Tell Of Days In Goodness Spent

by sasha_b



Category: Forever (TV)
Genre: F/M, Light Angst, Memories, Yuletide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-22
Updated: 2014-11-22
Packaged: 2018-02-26 16:01:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,695
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2657981
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sasha_b/pseuds/sasha_b
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Henry and Jo walk home, and Henry remembers.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Tell Of Days In Goodness Spent

**Author's Note:**

  * For [BadWifeSteff](https://archiveofourown.org/users/BadWifeSteff/gifts).



> Post episode eight, _The Ecstasy of Agony_. Spoilers for up through this episode.

Henry’s neck hurts.

He stays at the bar long enough to have two glasses of cognac, and one of port, even though they’d had to twist his arm.

Well, not really, but he’ll let Lucas think he had to.

It’s rained while they’d been in the pub, and Henry meanders slowly, thoughts unaccustomedly filled with the thought of another woman besides Abigail. When he realizes he’s doing it, he freezes, one foot raised, scarf tangling artfully about his shoulders, the wind in the city picking up, a myriad of smells coming to him, distracting, annoying. But –

_Henry Morgan, I love you._

“Henry?”

He shakes his head and puts his foot down. Stars sparkle overhead; he looks up. He’s always been fascinated by them and the movement – ancient, older than almost everything by the time their light reaches Earth. Older than him. He tilts his head and hisses – his neck still aches horribly and his chest as well – he’s exhausted despite the fact it’s been a day or so since his abduction. Pursing his lips, he wonders how many times he’ll have to deal with something like _that_. Hopefully just the once. 

He laughs to himself, feeling unusually morose and tired, and turns his head as Jo reaches him, her coat enveloping her. It’s starting to get brisk; winter is coming and the city will soon be white all ‘round. White that covers a lot of the dirt and dreck and death and mayhem he’s all too familiar with and wants to fix but he can’t fix everything, despite what he wants. Despite what Abigail had said about his intellect and his abilities and the gift of the long life he’s had, has, will have. He’d have thought that whomever gifted him (cursed him) with his unending years might have done so in order for him to do real _good_ in the world. 

Not so far, that he can tell. Save Abe, really, and he smiles a bit at that thought. It doesn’t last.

“Jo,” he answers perfunctorily. He feels the alcohol he’s drunk; it’s a strong buzz, shaking loose some things he’d hidden from himself up until recently. He reaches up to fix his askew scarf as he sticks out his right elbow, crooked, the hand in his pocket.

“I’ll see you home?”

She crunches her eyebrows together, her lovely face pinched and worried, and she stares at him briefly before sighing and slipping her cold hand through the crook his bent elbow has made. They walk and she opens her mouth.

“Are you alright?” Her voice is low and musical and Henry finds himself thinking he’s been really lucky in all the women in his lives. His life. This one is kind and smart and he’s finding he likes having her as his “partner” as it were, finds he likes it when she calls him, finds he likes it when he’s helping her.

He shrugs and his neck and back ache like the devil still. Not enough drink to cover that or what happened earlier. Even if it had brought another interesting woman into his life – but he doesn’t know if Iona is a good choice or even someone he should see –

“Hello? Earth to Henry?”

They stop at a red light and Jo nudges him. “I’m fine, detective. Sore. Bed will do me good.” He smiles again without feeling it – his brain is too mired in the loves he’s wanted to forget and the betrayal he’s been forced to remember recently. He shakes his head again, left hand rising to wipe over his face, and he feels the alcohol again more strongly and when they cross the street at the green, he surreptitiously pulls Jo closer to him. Ostensibly to protect her from the wind. And the cold that’s coming. Or maybe he just wants another person near him. Even if it’s not Abigail, and even if it’s not someone he should be close to like this.

They walk and he stares at the stars and he thinks of Abigail and Nora and now Iona and Jo and he must have mumbled something, as Jo stops abruptly and cocks her head, staring at him, her eyes catching his, too intent and close and the wind picks up and he can’t help but step closer to her and _he could have died again, which wouldn’t have mattered, but so many times, so many deaths, so much pain and anguish and will he ever get to be with someone again, just be a human again, he has to watch Abe age and die after doing it with Abigail and he doesn’t think he can handle it anymore and his neck aches_ he takes another step and does what the alcohol tells him to do and brushes his mouth over Jo’s, leaning over her, his shadow from the street lights overwhelming hers, despite her height.

She shakes suddenly – he can feel it where he’s touching her – she moves toward him almost involuntarily, the wind tearing at them in a weird jerky gust. Just as suddenly, her hands on his arms freeze and stiffen and he pulls away before she can shove him.

His blood drains from his body, his skin freezing and he is mortified and no longer drunk.

“Jo,” he stammers, _so unlike you, Henry_ , “I apologize. I am sure I’ve had too much to drink. I am so very – ”

She grabs his scarf and pulls him to her.

They break apart after a dizzying moment; Henry slowly opens his eyes and finds her austere, lovely face watching him, sorrow in her gaze, mouth quirked into a thin, drawn out line. Her hair blows about her face and the traffic noise from the street invades him, his ears hurting, his head throbbing. What just –

“I’ve been wondering what that would be like,” Jo says quietly. She sighs. “And yet, no.” Her right hand releases his scarf and rises to her neck, the gold of her necklace winking at him in the gloom of the chill evening. He can almost see the outline of the ring on the chain she still wears.

He opens his mouth to say _I can’t, either_ , indignant; perhaps the drinks are still affecting him after all. She holds up her hand. “I’m sorry.” 

He realizes she’s still holding onto one of the ends of his scarf, gently disentangles it from her fingers. He narrows his eyes and pushes a stray piece of hair behind her ear. “You have nothing to be sorry for, detec – Jo.” He swallows roughly over everything he’s experienced in the past few days and thoughts of Nora that the events have brought up. Bad taste, that.

“Our jobs are stressful,” he adds, trying to help. “It’s only natural that we’ve gravitated toward one another.” _Oh, if only she knew._ He smiles and she just shakes her head, her laugh rueful and slightly bitter. “You don’t have to explain it away, Henry,” her voice is almost blown away with the crisp wind. “I know what I wanted to do. And I did it. And now I need to go home.”

He nods; taking her hand and tucking it back inside his elbow, they walk the final few blocks to her apartment without speaking.

She turns and her hair blows back into her face, a physical curtain that stops him from being able to see her eyes and the truth hidden there. What would he find if he were able to see them? And why would it matter? He can’t love anyone else. Not like he’d loved Abigail. And Nora, a thousand lifetimes ago. He can’t hurt himself and he can’t hurt this kind and beautiful woman watching him, standing on the stoop of her building, dark hair shielding her face, until she shoves it back impatiently and raises her eyebrows.

“Goodnight, detective,” Henry says after a moment full and thick and Jo nods, the edges of her full lips curling just slightly. And before he can say anything else, she’s gone inside.

“She walks in beauty, like the night, of cloudless climes and starry skies; and all that’s best of dark and bright meet in her aspect and her eyes,” Henry sighs the words softly, barely moving his mouth. All of them, beauty personified, and he just the one man, supposedly here for some good that he hasn’t discovered yet.

It can certainly be trying when one is just attempting to live what passes for a normal life and be happy, as much as one can alone.

He has Abe. For now. But he won’t go there, as the young ones say these days – to him, every day can be an eternity or a heartbeat, quick and deadly or amazing and life affirming. He’s lucky, really, when he thinks about it.

He looks up at the stars, and they seem to see him this time, as old as they are. Even in their dotage they are gorgeous things, almost as gorgeous as the gift of forever he’s been given.

Tomorrow they will have a new case, for this is New York, after all, and tomorrow his neck won’t hurt so much, and tomorrow he and Abe can finally try that bottle of Malvasia Abe’s been holding on to for almost ten years now. He smiles at the thought of that. And perhaps some Chopin to go along with –

The wind picks up and he shivers and speeds up when he catches sight of the subway entrance; it’s cold and he’s still a bit – maudlin, or drunk – and he wants the lights and he wants his home with his son and he wants to be away from places where his thinking becomes too broad.

He sits on the rocking underground car, legs crossed, scarf wrapped about his bruised throat, hands folded primly in his lap, and allows himself one tiny thought of the feel of Jo’s lips on his, and then they’re Nora’s, Iona’s, and finally Abigail’s.

Reaching home, he locks the door behind him and leans on the glass, eyes closed, the ancient stars behind him fading with the fog that’s begun to roll in from the Hudson.

**Author's Note:**

> I attempted to keep this light, as is Henry's wont imho, but as I am a traditional angst writer, I'm sure more of that came out than I'd like it to have. But…if I had lived 200 plus years, I might be a bit mood-swingy too. ;) And having just been through an abduction and probably his first kiss since Abigail, I'm sure Henry's feeling a bit strange.
> 
> The poem quoted and title come from Lord Byron's _She Walks In Beauty_ , which I think Henry would like.
> 
> Happy Yuletide, dear readers!


End file.
